LIBRARIES in Oxfordshire have been given a stay of execution after it was revealed no cash would be cut from their budgets this year.

Under plans unveiled last year, 20 libraries were due to have their funding withdrawn from December 31.

That left them facing closure unless communities volunteered to run the branches themselves.

But after widespread opposition, county council leader Keith Mitchell withdrew the proposal in March.

He announced that a consultation would run until September on fresh proposals to cut £2m from the service’s annual budget.

But campaign groups were not told whether the cash would still be cut in December, leaving them little time to save threatened branches after the consultation ended.

Until now, the council refused to answer the Oxford Mail’s questions as to whether the funding deadline had been scrapped.

Now a written answer given by councillor Judith Heathcoat, who is responsible for libraries, has confirmed the money will not be withdrawn at the end of 2011.

She said: “As a result of an additional late government grant, £300,000 was put back into the library service budget as part of setting the county council’s budget in February.

“This is giving us the opportunity to rethink our strategy and means that the library service will not be required in 2011-2012 to make any other savings than those which can be delivered primarily through the introduction of self service into a number of major town libraries.”

She added: “As no decisions have been made to date nor will they be made now until the late autumn, I can confirm that there is no longer a deadline of December 31, 2011, for withdrawal of funding from any library.”

Liberal Democrat councillor Jean Fooks, who asked the question, said it would give reassurance to library campaigners.

She said: “This gives people a bit of breathing space and it is good to know the funding will not be withdrawn at the end of December.

“It was far too short a time to find rescue plans for the libraries.

“This will give groups more time to work out what they can afford, where they can get money from, and how they can run libraries.”

Judith Wardle, chairman of Save Oxfordshire’s Libraries, said: “It is good news in that it gives us clear information instead of us having to guess what was going on.

“It does not change what might happen in future financial years, but until the council have written their consultation document, we don’t know what is even on the table.

“This does give us more room to do our own needs assessments for individual libraries, and hopefully all libraries will be doing that.”